2025-01-04
Labor has failed to make any significant infrastructure or arts investment in Fremantle. This creates an opportunity for The Greens to localise their Fremantle campaign, for example on the housing crisis where we should highlight the many state government parcels of land in Fremantle that are boarded up or empty
By Brad Pettitt MLC, former Mayor of Fremantle and number one on The Greens Legislative Council ticket for the 2025 state election
INTRODUCTION BY ROB DELVES
Peter is a good friend who lives in the Melbourne Teal electorate of Kooyong. A few weeks ago, he was gobsmacked when Amellia Hamer, the Liberal candidate, knocked on his door and announced that her campaign focus was to ensure that the nearby level crossing would be removed to enable smoother traffic flow.
His reply was along the lines of: “I’m not interested in any federal candidate talking about local roads. I want to know what you’ll do about climate change, the massive inequality driving the housing crisis, and justice for our First Nations people”
Does Peter represent the majority view in expecting federal candidates to focus on the national and international issues? Probably not, at least according to the presumed wisdom of the saying “All Politics are Local.”
My own opinion is that localised messaging isn’t the main game, but it’s an important addition and we should be well prepared to answer the (very likely) question “What are you going to do for Fremantle/Perth/Curtin/Victoria Park?”
However, all three Greens elected to Brisbane seats in 2022 gave the same answer when asked about the key to their success: “Localise Your Campaign.”
What does localising involve? I recall Sophie Greer’s advice to the approx. 85 people who participated in the Perth doorknock with Adam Bandt several weeks ago. She emphasised the housing, cost of living and climate change/energy policies that she wanted us to make the focus of our conversations. However, she then added that we needed to know her campaign’s position on three local issues that residents are concerned about and she spent about a minute on each of them. One was the crisis in much-loved Hyde Park caused by the shot-borer infestation killing trees.
We should try to lock our broad policies more specifically into the local area. Housing is probably the most obvious example, if only for the simple reason that every house is a local house. In the article that follows, Brad explains how WA Labor’s neglect of the safe seat of Fremantle opens many opportunities for our campaign, beginning with this powerful question: In the middle of a housing crisis why are several government parcels of land in Fremantle still boarded up or empty, despite repeated community calls for building to begin?
Brad’s title for this opinion piece is:
The Greens and the Opportunity of Fremantle’s Safe Seat Blues
On top of the failure to address the housing crisis, the climate crisis, and the cost-of-living crisis, Fremantle residents have good reason to be fed up with WA Labor.
Putting aside road projects, what’s the last major community investment that Fremantle has received from the major parties?
The answer? Fremantle Maritime Museum, which was initiated by the Liberal Court government in the late 1990s, or 25 years ago. Since then, Fremantle has had almost no state government investment in the City of Fremantle or the state seat of Fremantle.
What about the Kings Square development? While the Department of Communities moving to Freo has been a good thing, this $270 million development was entirely funded by the City of Fremantle and the private sector. In fact, in the end, it saved the State Government $53 million.
But wait! Fremantle did get the Mainroads monstrosity that is the $118 million High Street upgrade; not a project design or scale that most Freo people wanted. The result speaks for itself.
More recently we scored the Fremantle Police Complex, which will cost $100 million and is in a location not supported by the Fremantle Council or the Fremantle community. A record 224 submissions against and none for. Despite this, it was rammed through the State's WAPC.
Then there is the new Fremantle Traffic Bridge. The Fremantle community raged against a series of previous iterations including an eastern alignment hard up against residents, and the even more absurd “Canning Highway on the foreshore” option.
Now we have WA Labor planning to move the Fremantle Port, a move that will gut Fremantle economically and destroy the Port City’s very identity.
At no point did we hear Fremantle’s local MPs stand up and oppose these awful solutions; it was only because of excellent advocacy and action by the Fremantle community that these options were replaced with the design we have in front of us today.
That’s just the infrastructure projects ̶ what about the arts? We have Spare Parts Puppet Theatre forced to leave their premises in Fremantle because their state-owned building is structurally unsound. We have a circus school using Fremantle Council managed land and a hot tent because there’s no state government solution for them. This has been going on for over six years now.
Where is the state government investment in Perth’s home of the arts? Why do we hear rumours that the state government is trying to take the circus to Midland and the northern suburbs? Why is Spare Parts having to perform at the Claremont Showgrounds and not in Fremantle?
On housing, why do some many state government parcels of land in Fremantle lay boarded up or empty in the middle of housing crisis? Neither of these is not because the state government is short of money.
I don’t blame Simone McGurk, it’s the way WA Labor works. It’s hard for Simone or any other local member in a safe seat to make a case for funds to Cabinet when there’s nothing in it for the party.
Case in point is the Fremantle Oval redevelopment. Consecutive Fremantle Councils have been working to redevelop the rundown Fremantle oval. The main block has been getting the state government to contribute funds. Yet the McGowan Government was quick to fund the $25 million East Fremantle Oval redevelopment because it was in the marginal seat of Bicton. Fremantle Oval to this day still has no commitment from the State Government and is possibly the last WAFL Oval to be upgraded.
Here lies the great opportunity for the Greens. The opportunity for us to localise our campaign and get Fremantle voters to understand that if they want more action from their state government, then they need to stop putting Labor first on their ballot paper.
And that’s why the Greens can win back Fremantle.
Header photo: Fremantle port Tim Oliver